“What we’re doing?”
And then I remember those ridiculous exercises Mark assigned. Which I was supposed to do at home. Which I haven’t done since I left SpineWorks. Which all of these broken people are doing out there, in this basement gym out of the eighties, while their therapists look on, hair also out of the eighties. Come on. Ten more, that’s it. Everybody faltering. Everybody scared that they are breaking themselves further. Voicing tremulous complaint/concern. Is it normal for it to feel like this? Is it normal for it to hurt more?
“Sure,” Mark says, putting on latex gloves.
Why gloves? I think. Why today? Doesn’t he want to examine me first? Doesn’t he want me to exercise?
“Pain is information. And your improvement here is telling us something. That we’ve hit upon the right method. So we just need to keep going. Stay the course, okay? Okay, so let’s have you lie down and—”
“But I haven’t been doing the exercises,” I blurt out. “I honestly think not doing them is what’s helped. Honestly, when I left last time, I hurt more. A lot more.”
I don’t look at Mark. I can’t look at Mark. I look at my leg, which is only lightly swinging now.
“How much?” I hear Mark ask, his voice sounding utterly zen. “On a scale from one to ten?”
I shrug. “I don’t know. Eight, nine, ten, I wanted to kill myself. Whatever number that is. That’s how I felt when I left here.”
Now I look at Mark. His face betrays no emotion. It’s possible I stuck with Mark because of that face, eerily neutral, handsome in that yoga-bro way. I even texted Grace his profile pic back when we first started together.
New therapist?
Not bad! Grace said. And I fancied, in my drugged-out pathetic way, that Mark and I were dating for a time. That he was my boyfriend, sort of. I brushed my hair before appointments. Put on lipstick. Doused myself in perfume. Wore cleanish jogging pants, one of my comelier T-shirt sacks. And Mark would notice.
That an owl?
Oh, hey, I like the Doors too. You have some cool T-shirts, Miranda.
Thank you.
And now look at us, look at me. I’m challenging him. He knows it. He’s looking at me in a way he’s never looked at me before. His face looks set in stone.
“But then you got better, didn’t you, Miranda?”
“I did, but I also didn’t do the exercises.”
“But you did them here, didn’t you? Thirty reps if I recall, correct?”
“Yes, but—”
“Forty-eight hours. It takes forty-eight hours usually after a session. For things to calm down, to settle, you know that. So imagine if you’d done them at home, if you’d trusted. You might be all better now instead of just… your foot.”
He looks at my foot, which isn’t swinging anymore. It’s near still. He smiles.
“Let’s do a few tests, okay? Why don’t you lie down for me.” Not a question.
A thin slice of pain behind my knee like a red flash, like a hiss. No, says my leg. No, no, no.
But I lie down.
“On your stomach, please. Flip over, that’s it. You know the drill. Careful.”
I’m facedown in the doughnut hole. Gazing at the rubber floor. At Mark’s black shoes. Shiny. Pointed. Tapping. Mark begins to prod my back with his gloved finger. I feel little shoots of fire going down my leg. My foot tingles lightly.
“Catch the game yesterday?” he asks me.
“No.” You know I’ve never caught the game. “That hurts, by the way. Down my leg.”
“Patriots won. You a Patriots fan, Miranda? I forget if I asked you.”
“You’ve asked me. Did you hear what I said about my leg?”
But Mark isn’t listening to me.
“Turn over, please.”
“Why?”
Silence. I’ve never asked this question before, not once.
“Because we’re going to try some traction today.”
No, I think. No traction. It’ll fuck up my leg. I know it. I feel it.
I turn to look at Mark. “Won’t that mess up my leg again?”
He smiles at me. A hard smile that leaves me cold. “Shouldn’t.”
I turn over. Mark straps me to the table with a belt. He wraps another belt around the top of one of my thighs and buckles it behind his lower back. He’s standing between my parted legs now, propping my belted leg up on his shoulder, holding my other leg down on the table with a firm hand. I look up at Mark gripping my raised leg against his shoulder, getting ready to pull, and I feel the webs begin to flash, fear creeping through me.